Slower reacquisition after partial extinction in human contingency learning.

Abstract

Extinction is a very relevant learning phenomenon from a theoretical and applied point of view. One of its most relevant features is that relapse phenomena often take place once the extinction training has been completed. Accordingly, as extinction-based therapies constitute the most widespread empirically validated treatment of anxiety disorders, one of their most important limitation is this potential relapse. We provide the first demonstration of relapse reduction in human contingency learning using mild aversive stimuli. This effect was found after partial extinction (i.e., reinforced trials were occasionally experienced during extinction, Experiment 1) and progressive extinction treatments (Experiment 3), and it was not only due to differences in uncertainty levels between the partial and a standard extinction group (Experiment 2). The theoretical explanation of these results, the potential uses of this strategy in applied situations, and its current limitations are discussed.Keywords: Extinction, contingency learning, relapse, aversive learning Slower reacquisition after partial extinction 2 Learning relationships between different events relevant to organisms is ubiquitous, and takes place almost constantly (Clark, 2013;Friston, 2003). Most of the time, this acquired knowledge is helpful, as it is the basis of useful predictions about future events or inferences about their relationships. However, it can also be maladaptive. For example, in many anxiety disorders, seemingly harmless cues may become associated to strong and disruptive emotional responses, leading to distress and daily problems for those suffering them (Beckers, Krypotos, Boddez, Effting, & Kindt, 2013;Mineka & Zinbarg, 2006).Fortunately, this type of learning is flexible in the sense that, once it has been acquired, it may be modified or altered. One of the ways in which this modification can take place is through extinction, the repeated presentation of a given cue in the absence of the consequences with which it had been previously associated (Pavlov, 1927). A progressive reduction in the acquired response to this cue is observed after experiencing a series of presentations of the cue alone. This flexibility allows the organism not only to adapt to changes in the cue-outcome relationships as they occur in the environment but also to ease those maladaptive forms of learning that lead to disruptive emotional responses. For example, in cognitive and behavioral therapies of anxiety disorders, exposure therapy -a repeated, systematic, and controlled exposure to the feared cue, in the absence of any traumatic event-seems to be a key component to success (Bouton, 2002, Longmore & Worrell, 2007Norton & Price, 2007). Unfortunately, extinction is not such a robust effect as acquisition itself, and several factors can lead to a recovery of the original fear response, or relapse. Thus, the current challenge is not so much to achieve the fear reduction but to prevent its relapse (Vervliet, Craske, & Hermans, 2013). The return of fear was firs...

Learned Overeating: Applying Principles of Pavlovian Conditioning to Explain and Treat Overeating

“…In CET, one way to implement this technique is by encouraging individuals to occasionally consume small amounts of food during cue exposure exercises, in order to learn that eating a small amount of food is no longer a cue for overeating [ 13 ]. In support, animal and human appetitive conditioning [ 51 , 76 ], as well as fear conditioning studies [ 77 , 78 ], has reported evidence for occasional reinforcements during extinction to reduce relapse of responding (i.e., rapid reacquisition). In studies on CET, occasional reinforced extinction has not yet been studied in isolation, but some studies have incorporated this technique in exposure sessions by letting participants take small bites of high-calorie food previously associated with overeating [ 74 •, 75 ].…”

Limitations of occasional reinforced extinction to alleviate spontaneous recovery and reinstatement effects: Evidence for a trial-signalling mechanism

“…Although only two cues were used here, A and B, the counterbalancing procedure included three different geometrical figures as cues. As in other experiments from our laboratory (see, for example, Morís et al, 2017) that included three cues, we decided not to alter the counterbalancing routine used here as if anything using three cues would make it more likely that any observed effects were independent of the specific geometrical figures used as cues A and B. All visual stimuli were presented against a light grey coloured background (RGB values of 128, 128, and 128) in the centre of the screen.…”

“…Specifically, we followed Morís et al’s (2017) Experiment 3 protocol, which used a gradual ORE treatment, as described previously. The procedure included three phases.…”

“…Fortunately, those preventive effects could be demonstrated in a study with human participants, albeit on a different form of relapse, namely, the rapid reacquisition of conditioning after extinction training (see Ricker & Bouton, 1996, for an animal study on this phenomenon). Morís et al (2017) used an aversive sound as the US and expectancy ratings to measure contingency learning. This study showed that the occasional presentation of CS-US pairings (i.e., reinforced trials) during the extinction phase diminished later reacquisition of the conditioned response (CR) compared with a standard extinction treatment.…”

“…Therefore, in our study, the extinction phase, as in the study by Morís et al (2017) and following Gershman et al (2013), included a gradually decreasing number of reinforced trials in the ORE group. Unlike previous attempts, (a) the number of trials during extinction training was sufficient to ensure that asymptotic expectancy ratings were equivalent in both the ORE and the standard extinction groups; (b) we focused on threat expectancy ratings (i.e., a cognitive component involved in the multidimensional fear response; given the interconnectedness of the different components of the fear response, this may be regarded as a starting point for a complete assessment of the preventive value of ORE); and (c) the possible preventive effects of ORE on spontaneous recovery and reinstatement were assessed independently from each other; thus, assessing one of these effects does not condition or interfere with the assessment of the other.…”